Tag: politics

Last week I participated in Day Without A Woman on International Women’s Day by attending a rally at my state capitol, wearing red, and not making any purchases that day.

I did not strike. I was lucky enough to be able to work from home, hoping that my physical absence may be felt, but my work would still get done. There are two reason I chose not to strike. One, being that I am pregnant, I will need the time off for maternity leave. My company offers FMLA leave, which allows me to be out for up to 480 work hours without risk of losing my job (roughly three months). But any pay I am to receive during that time comes from my accumulated sick and vacation time, so using it now means I don’t get to use it later. Some may say this is exactly why I should strike – to show that this policy is inadequate to meet the needs of new moms and dads. That we should have better paid leave policies for maternity/paternity. These are things that I agree with and would fight for. But my second reason for not striking is a bit more compelling…

I work with all women. My team is all women, and though we work for a larger organization that has these maternity leave policies, the work I am doing right now affects the long term careers of these other women. They were relying on me to meet a deadline with my piece of the project so they could continue with theirs. Our failure on this project would not affect the overall organization we work for very much, but it would affect the careers of these other women. It simply did not make sense to me to hold these other women back in any way.

Striking was a good choice for many. In a different circumstance I would have participated in the strike. Not because I think that I suffer injustices at work for being a woman (like I said, working with all women eliminates a lot of the discrimination other women suffer). I feel I am adequately and fairly compensated and am encouraged in my career growth. However, it is not for me that I participated in the rally.

It is for all the other women who could not rally

women who do suffer injustices at work

women who are paid less than a man for the same work

women who cannot take personal leave without the risk of being fired or reprimanded

women who are sick of a mostly male government deciding what she can and cannot do with her body

women who are accused of “bringing it on themselves” when they have been assaulted or abused

I rallied because I wish for a better future for my daughter. As women we have all felt at least some of the things I listed above. There are certainly more things that could be added to this list, these are just the ones that come immediately to mind. I know I cannot shelter my daughter from all of these cultural injustices and she will some day experience some of these. My hope is that it gets better as times wears on. I did feel an energy at the rally that was really encouraging. We need to keep the energy alive and not let it wane.

The saddest part of the Day Without A Woman protests were the attacks from other women. The last thing we need is to tear each other down for standing up for what we believe. Even if it isn’t something that you care about or believe in, we should be proud that we are even allowed to have our own opinions that can be expressed publicly! It’s the women who came before us that have allowed us this expression. How you use it is your choice, but isn’t that a beautiful thing too!

In pregnancy news I am 34 weeks today! Only 6 short weeks to go. I cannot believe we are getting this close!

Did any of you participate in any of the Day Without A Woman activities? How did it go?

Anyone with daughters have advice on raising them to be confident and secure?

So I will be 28 weeks along tomorrow! I am officially in my third trimester – home stretch!

It’s becoming clearer to me by the day (by the minute!) that I need to take care of myself first and foremost. Because right now, caring for myself and my baby are one in the same.

But there are so many things happening so quickly in the world around us. It is hard not to want to simultaneously get outraged at ALL of it, and bury my head in the sand and ignore it all. I see friends on both extremes. The ones posting constant Facebook updates of what has is happening and how terrible it all is. It’s all happening so fast that there’s a new article, meme, or breaking news livestream at least every thirty minutes. It’s exhausting.

And then there’s the friends who are are asking when we can all go back to just posting cat videos and pictures of our food. Not wanting to address any of it.

I believe in balance. I know I cannot get outraged about every issue – there are just too many of them. I am happy to show my support in many ways to many issues, but I cannot show up to every march and every rally.

So here are the things I am doing:

Calling or Emailing my Senators

it only takes five minutes to let your opinion be known

The staffers taking calls are usually polite and they have to pass your views onto the senators (even if it’s just tallying yays and nays on an issue)

I feel like I can speak up about a lot more issues if I restrict myself to doing just this one thing for most of the issues I am hearing about.

Re-posting information I find helpful and thorough on social media

I know this isn’t always helpful, I have said before that I am mostly preaching to the choir. Though I do have some friends with different views so perhaps I am reaching them in a small way

I discriminate which things I will share. Only things from trusted sources, nothing click-bait-y or extreme.

Commenting with Caution

If I feel someone genuinely wants to engage in a discussion, I am willing to oblige.

But only on topics I feel knowledgeable about! (this is key, don’t get into something unless you really know what you are talking about!)

If it turns petty I tune out. No reason to keep arguing with someone for the sake of arguing. That only drives a further wedge.

Get Educated

You cannot be an expert on all things, and that’s okay! If you feel strongly about an issue that is happening, learn more about that issue!

This goes in hand with the above, if you care about something and want to engage in conversation about it – learn all you can!

Focus on one or two issues that really hit home for you and try to learn as much as you can about them and how people are affected.

Do not feel guilty that you do not care about the same issues as other people. Do not let other people make you feel guilty for not latching onto their issues, and don’t get mad at others for having their own concerns.

Change can take a really long time. You will burn out, we will all burn out, if we all try to take on every issue that comes across our Facebook feed. Let some of them go. Have faith that good, hard working people will stand up.

Marches and Rallies

Certain subjects do strike a chord with me more than others. For those issues I truly connect with, I think showing up in numbers does make a great impact. If I tried to go to them all, I would probably be burying my head in the sand already with exhaustion. Pick your battles. There’s going to be a lot, and you’re going to need to rested and prepared!

REMEMBER WE ARE ALL HUMANS. I am seeing friends post things on Facebook like: “Okay friends who supported Trump, is this really what you wanted? How can you keep supporting him after ‘X’ (chose anything he’s done in the last two weeks).” It is tempting to call people out and hold them accountable. The problem is, people who voted for Trump did so for a wide range of reasons. They may not agree with what he has been doing, but cognitive dissonance is a real thing. They may be struggling with their feelings about some of the things that are happening and if we call them out and ask them to defend Trump’s executive orders and tweets and press conferences before they’ve had a chance to REALLY think about it, you can bet that they will justify his actions. They will find some reason why what he is doing is okay, because we are all human, and we all defend the choices we make when we are pushed up against a wall.

I think the best strategy is to approach them with compassion. This is hard. But give them the space and the safety to come to their own conclusions about what is happening. Some will continue to defend everything he is doing, they will refuse to admit that anything he is doing is wrong and they will insist that liberals are overreacting. However, there will be others who say ‘this isn’t what I wanted’ and will slowly come around to understanding the potential damage of the way he is conducting business. But we cannot be tempted to force this view. We must stop ourselves from “I told you so’s!” Shaming and blaming are not how we move forward with progress.

If we get enraged by every issue. If we pick a fight with everyone with a differing view from our own. If we try to re-post every article and meme and purport to be experts on all topics. If we attend every rally and march. We will burn out. We will not be effective catalysts of change.

Last weekend we witnessed the incredible coming together of millions of people all over the world to march for their voices to be heard. It was called the women’s march, but (unlike the good ole boys clubs of the past) all were welcome and included in this record breaking event.

What started as a march for women’s rights (already a broad topic in and of itself) quickly morphed to include ANY man, woman or child who felt that their voices were not being heard, that their government was not listening and did not care about them. This was a march to ‘take the power back.’ A march to remind our politicians, and our newly instated president, that they work for US. WE are in charge!

I have spent the last few weeks since the election trying to muster motivation to take charge and fight for change, only to actually feel powerless and silenced. I live in a big(ish) city that definitely leans liberal, as most cities do, but my state as a whole is about as conservative as they come. Sure, I shared plenty of articles and information on my Facebook, but let’s be honest – that’s probably just preaching to the crowd. My like-minded friends would like and share my posts and I, in return, would like and share theirs. Just a big circle jerk. But I couldn’t fathom any action that I could do that would actually make any difference.

But that changed a bit on Saturday with witnessing just how many people are feeling the same way I am. Luckily there were enough people who did feel like they could make a difference by organizing and energizing this movement. They didn’t feel powerless or silences, and I am so thankful they didn’t!

It doesn’t matter that we aren’t all rallying behind the same exact issue. What matters is that all of us – SO MANY OF US – are feeling unheard, unrepresented.

It was invigorating! It was inspiring!

It was just what I needed to buckle down and say NO MORE. No more silence from me. It is too important to our future, to my daughter’s future, that I don’t just bury my head in the sand. Time to get involved.

So I signed up on the Women’s March 10 Actions in 100 Days email list. Anyone interested should do the same. The first action is to write a letter to your senators about your concerns that aren’t being heard. They have a template you can print off if you’d like.

I also came across this helpful article if you are shy about calling your representatives.

Since this is a private blog, I have been reluctant to share photos. But I am pretty sure no one in my real life has stumbled on this blog yet, so here I am with a bump photo from Sunday.

I haven’t really delved into any of the specific topics of #whyImarch, but this post is getting lengthy as it is. In the future, in addition to pregnancy and baby updates, you can expect me to weigh in on various topics I care about.

Feel free to ask me any questions you have, or please comment below on what issues are of concern to you right now! I would love to hear from you